In stripping external plastic tubing or other tubular sheath material from preassembled multi-conductor cable to allow the lineman to splice and/or terminate the conductors enclosed therein, one prior art method has been of hack-sawing the tubing. However, this exposes the conductors within the tubing to the risk of being cut unintentionally and has resulted in many conductor failures.
The prior art has also provided various forms of cutting tools for the specific purpose of cutting and stripping metal or other sheathing of electric conductor cables. Such tools are shown in the following prior art U.S. patents: Walker, U.S. Pat. No. 2,348,429; Thompson, U.S. Pat. No. 2,363,758; Jones, U.S. Pat. No. 2,370,733; Vaughan, Jr. U.S. Pat. No. 2,691,822; Kraus, U.S. Pat. No. 2,924,879; Davis U.S. Pat. No. 3,116,554; Stabs, U.S. Pat. No. 3,162,945; Pettit et al, U.S. Pat. No. 3,624,901.
The tool provided by the present invention is generally similar to but is an improvement over the tool shown in the Kraus patent U.S. Pat. No. 2,924,879, as will be described.